Trembling
by Cerih
Summary: Warning, now major spoilers to Children of Earth. Jack has a certain effect on Ianto, which Ianto explores during the new crisis. Ianto/Jack pairing. Now complete.
1. Trembling

Disclaimer: I don't own Torchwood, Ianto or Jack. Alas they all belong to the BBC. Only the words below are mine.

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"You've been seen."

Ianto had a sinking feeling in his stomach as he struggled to maintain his polite, expressionless face while he was listening to his sister's excited voice telling him where he had dined with Jack. "I remember", he wanted to say, "I was there". But he stayed silent, with his heart trembling.

He had been so happy that night when they dined in the French restaurant. Jack had leaned close to make a suggestive comment in his low, sensual voice, and their knees had briefly touched. Ianto had gripped his wine glass tighter than was strictly necessary in order to keep his hands from trembling. Still, a crimson drop escaped from the glass as he tilted it to his lips. It stained his linen napkin bright red and Ianto looked at it for a long moment just to stop himself from getting lost deep within Jack's familiar eyes.

Jack had referred to them as 'us'. That had to mean something, right? But then, he had also said that he hated the word couple. Ianto had said he agreed, but what was he supposed to say? That he had never loved anything in his life as much as he loved Jack and that he wanted to spend the rest of his life by the captain's side. It was no use, Jack was too wild to be tied down by anything as mundane as an ordinary relationship. But Ianto could not help the tiny hope trembling within him.

At night, when they lay in each other's arms and Jack ran his hands gently over Ianto's warm skin, the younger man trembled all over. All he could manage were strangled pleas for more, although what he really wanted was to ask Jack never to leave him.

And now he was standing on a roof a building, surveying the wreckage that had been the Hub, the wreckage in which his lover was buried. Ianto's knees trembled as he prayed for any sign that Jack had survived the terrible explosion. Having been caught up in the blast himself and having later escaped with difficulty from the sniper trying to kill him had suddenly lost all meaning. His voice was hoarse and trembled as he whispered out what he had said to his sister only hours earlier:

"It's just him. It's only him."


	2. Clarity

Disclaimer: Much as I'd want to, I don't own Torchwood.

Note: This chapter was already planned in my head before I saw Day Four yesterday evening. As I wrote it today, some of the words took a rather ironic meaning. After this, there will be at least two more chapters, perhaps more depending what happens tonight during Day Five.

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Clarity

"So one day, you'll see me die – of old age – and just keep going?"

The moment of clarity was like the first ray of rising sun on a new day burning through the obscuring mist. Time seemed to have frozen for Ianto as the moment stretched seemingly on forever. Suddenly things had clicked. Suddenly he saw everything in a new light. Suddenly he understood.

Jack was afraid. He said he hated the word couple, but really he was just afraid. Ianto could barely conceive of the horror of seeing one's friends and lovers wither and die. But Jack had to go through that over and over, while never aging a day himself. Never aging physically anyway, for Ianto saw Jack's real age reflected in his eyes time and time again. The Captain carried so much loss and sorrow, so many memories within him that it was surprising that he did not crumble under all the weight.

Ianto had always thought it was his fault, that he was not brave or beautiful enough – not special enough – to win Jack's love. But now he saw that Jack was just trying to protect himself against the inevitable loss, mainly by holding back, by not opening his heart to Ianto completely. Knowledge of the future loss and sorrow must have been in Jack's mind every time he looked at his young lover.

As time resumed its never-ending course, Ianto desperately wanted to embrace Jack. He wanted to hold the older man close and whisper in his ear that it was okay, that he finally understood. That he would stand by Jack's side and love him until the end of his days, hopefully many decades from present.

But here, in the middle of a global crisis, was not the time nor the place for such sentimentality. So instead he offered Jack a small smile and said the firs thing that came to his mind:

"Well, we better make the most of it then."


	3. Betrayal

Disclaimer: Torchwood is still not mine, and still I wish it was.

Note: Once again this chapter holds a certain irony after Day Four. I guess you can all guess what the next chapter is going to be about. *sigh*

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Betrayal

"I've only just skimmed the surface, haven't I?

Ianto felt betrayed and it seemed like it could not hurt any more if Jack had actually stabbed him in the chest with a real blade. He trusted his lover, he truly did, but every time Ianto thought that his life with Jack was nigh perfect, something from the Captain's past emerged to mock his naïve love. If it was not Jack pining after the Doctor and Rose, it was a possessive and jealous ex-lover showing up to torment the team. This time it seemed to be gifting 12 innocent children to an unknown race of aliens.

Ianto let out a shuddering breath and fought hard to stop bitter tears from overflowing his eyes and cleaving salty paths across his face. The Welshman had only ever held back two things from Jack: The first one had been Lisa, which had not turned out well at all. The other secret hung unspoken between them and Ianto was painfully aware of it whenever he was near the Captain. Sometimes he thought Jack surely must have known that he was in love with the immortal man, other times he was not so certain. Perhaps their fearless leader truly was as blind as an ordinary human when it came to certain matters of the heart.

Now Ianto was in the middle of a nightmare once more. It seemed that his carefully constructed world, which in actual fact was made merely of hopes, interpretations and things left unspoken, was crumbling to sand all around him and the tide was drawing ever closer to flush it into something unrecognisable. The idea that Jack would love him and confide in him when he could speak to no other suddenly felt like a dream of a foolish child, before he was rudely awaken to the realities of the world in which he was living.

And yet, even amidst feeling like Jack's betrayal would surely tighten his throat until he choked to death, Ianto's love and loyalty prevailed. Whatever burden of past sins Jack carried unspoken, however much Jack's lack of trust wounded him, the Captain did not hurt Ianto enough to drive the Welshman away. Come what may, Ianto would stand by Jack's side to the end of his days.


	4. Hero

Disclaimer: Torchwood is still not mine. And I've just cried through Day Five. Damn you BBC!

Note: There will be one more chapter after this, which I will most likely write tonight. But expect no happy endings here. *sad sigh*

*****

Hero

Ianto Jones was not a hero. He did not go out into the field to rescue people from Weevils and other aliens. He never saved the day.

He was not a genius like Toshiko, battle-ready like Owen, or brave like Gwen. He made the coffee, cleaned the Hub and did the archiving. He offered his body to his Captain – no strings attached – when Jack needed the comfort of another being next to him. He may have made the best coffee in the world, but that still made him just the Tea Boy.

Ianto Jones never wanted to be a hero. He spent most of his time endeavouring to be invisible and, like many things he did, he was very good at it. So good in fact that he managed to hide Lisa right under the watchful eye of their leader. So good that no one, except perhaps Jack, could say they knew him. Even those who he called friends never did breach the carefully constructed facades, the walls that kept him safe and the expressionless face that hid his true feelings.

The members of Torchwood never truly realised how much they depended on Ianto. He kept them caffeinated, well fed and ensured that everything was neat and tidy. He maintained the Hub and he maintained them. Even on those very rare occasions when Ianto called in sick and nothing seemed to go quite right in the Hub did not make the others understand just how much they had come to rely on Ianto. He even managed to make the warehouse of Torchwood One seem cosy and the others settled right in.

He may have helped Torchwood do great things, but no one would ever thank Ianto for any of it, call him a hero, or notice him at all. He had succeeded in truly becoming invisible to the world.

But now, as he stood, fought and died by his Captain's side, loyal to the very last breath, Ianto Jones was the true hero he had always been.


	5. Empty

Disclaimer: I still don't own Torchwood. :(

Note: Now complete.

*****

Empty

Captain Jack Harkness stared at the blank wall before him with unseeing eyes. Numbly, his mind was trying to comprehend everything that had happened in the past five days. He had been arguing with Ianto about whether they were a couple or not – how insignificant it seemed now. And the wild joy of discovering Gwen's pregnancy that had so quickly been replaced with the terror of having a bomb in his stomach. The feeling of exploding, only to be re-grown over torturous hours when every second of agony seemed to last a life time. Drowning in concrete had been a new experience, that particular death having later been banished by his lover wearing rather dashing high visibility clothing and a hard hat. The look on Ianto's face as he suggested they have a quickie in the middle of the world ending. The look of hurt and betrayal in Ianto's eyes when he found out yet another one of Jack's secrets. Those few, too short, moments when they made a stand, side by side, defiant before both a hostile alien race and the government that had tried so very hard to assassinate them. Ianto dying in his arm and the pain that followed, to which only death could offer the briefest respite. Saying goodbye to Gwen and Rhys. Being reunited with his daughter, only to sacrifice his own grandchild to save thirty-five million children.

Jack could not decide what should hurt most, the loss of his daughter, his grandson or his beloved Ianto. He knew however that the numbness, the emptiness he was currently feeling, would eventually subside and make way to the pain. Jack longed for permanent death, truly prayed with his heart and soul behind it, but such mercy was not for people like him.

What was once the Hub was now just a hole in the ground. He himself had been tortured and killed more times than he cared to remember over the past five days. His beautiful Ianto was gone. All there was left of Torchwood were Gwen and software stored in a server somewhere. The government had done their best to destroy Torchwood and, with a little help from 456, they had succeeded. The Torchwood Institute was gone.

Through it all, Jack carried on. He moved through days, towns, nights, quiet roads, always empty. The pain came eventually, of course, but it was always eclipsed by the emptiness. And so all there was left for Captain Jack Harkness to do was running.

Jack ran across Earth and later across the galaxies. He ran so far and so long he almost forgot who he was. The pain subsided eventually, just as he had known it would, but emptiness never quite went away. Jack bore the emptiness as a deserved punishment for the crimes he had committed and for which he would atone the rest of his immortal life.

Through the miles and light years, through the years, decades and centuries, Jack never forgot Ianto. He had the Welshman's name tattooed on his skin and he always carried a scratched and broken stop watch in a pocket over his heart. Because of the memories etched deep within Jack's heart, the love of Ianto Jones, a man with mortal body and soul broken far too soon, remained shining through eternity.


End file.
